Esroc:Excessive, but still. Fark those people. The other day I tried to buy a single tube of toothpase and the lady at the 20 items or less isle had a cart full, a check book, AND broke up the items into three groups with three separate checks for some damn reason.

Sometimes I wish I could get into the heads of these people and try to understand their thought process.

I would be OK with surcharges for excess items. Specifically, surcharges that grow exponentially.

Say it's a 15-item lane -- the 16th item might ring up for an extra dime. The 17th for an extra 20 cents. The 18th for 40. And so on and so on.

Then a slight miscalculation about how many items you have or an impulsive Kit Kat that puts you over 15 gets punished, but not severely. However, showing up in the express lane with a full cart will let them remodel the store.

Some idiot in front of me in the express lane actually took the time (a lot of it) to go through his change and count out 97 cents when his total came to $3.97. If that doesn't deserve a cock-punch, I don't know what does.

At my local Walmart, the express lane is almost always worked by the most ancient person in the store. Express lane my ass. The woman is so slow you can go through the regular checkout behind an elderly cat lady with 100 cans of cat food and a checkbook she doesn't bother to drag out until every can is wrung up, and still get out before the guy buying a pack of Camels in the express lane.

My life is such that I am roped into taking my mother-in-law to the Muncie, Indiana Wal-Mart on alternating Saturdays. For reasons that I'm sure are based on the area's demographics, there are NO self-checkouts in that place. So you need to pick which of the three open lanes (in a packed store), you'd like to waste a chunk of your life in.

Said choice is followed, inevitably, by at least a twenty-minute wait, "express lane" or no, behind some white trash couple with a baby, two loud, hyperactive toddlers, and one in the oven as they locate their food stamps (literal, printed on paper, certificates) and hand them to the cashier. The cashier must then sort the certificates and the contents of two heaping grocer carts, take out a calculator and a three-ring binder, do calculations, fill out some goddamn form or six, and argue with the freeloading idiots who always seem to think that the store is trying to screw them out of something. At some point in this process, one or both of the couple will look at the next person in line (me), and crack some joke about taking so long.

Yes, I can understand where the equivalent to road rage might crop up in such an environment.

[old men voices]OM#1: Hey. That's 21 items! the sign says 20 or less!OM#2: There's 2 cans of creamed corn in there. That counts as 1 item because they are 2 for 1 today.OM#1: No it doesn't! It says 20 ITEMS! 2 cans are 2 ITEMS!OM#2: STFU and go fark your wifes dusty vagoo before it withers away![/old men voices]